A Baby Story

To understand where I'm headed, I suppose it helps to say where I've been.  So....


Here I am, the night before Cameron arrived.  My hospital bag was packed and I was enjoying my favorite night time treat - a single serving container of Ben and Jerry's Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream.

Brian and I were up before the crack of dawn on Tuesday April 5th.  It happened to be a voting day in STL, and I really like wearing (flaunting!) my "I VOTED" sticker, so we went down the street to exercise our civic duty.  All the poll workers were very impressed by our dedication (though it took FOREVER for them to find me on their list. I have a very complicated last name :)  ) While we were at our polling place, the hospital called to see if we could come early, as they had an opening. Since when do hospitals run early? Had a good laugh about that.

As Cameron had refused to turn (or didn't have enough room to rotate properly), I was scheduled for a C-section.  The anesthesiologist who did my spinal was a little nutty - when preparing me for surgery, she asked if I was really tan or this was my natural skin color... REALLY?!  My parents were even in the room... unless she thought they were really tan too.  When she was inserting my spinal block, she was complaining to the nurses, in heavy Boston accent, that her nanny had blocked her on facebook.  At this point, I did begin to wonder about this lady and if she should really be sticking needles in my spine, but we'd pretty much reached the point of no return.  My c-section started at 9:03; Cameron was delivered at 9:11.  Brian took this picture of me immediately after I first heard Cameron cry.

Cameron's legs were/are still a little jankety because he was breech.

We were expecting him to weigh in the high sixes or low sevens..... Our little chunker weighed in at a whopping 7 lbs, 15 oz.  Clearly, all those peanut butter cups I inhaled in my last month made a difference!

I was still a little woozy when we returned to the Recovery area..... But so excited for my little family! 

For those of you who know me, you know I am not a "kids" person.  I've never cooed over babies or enjoyed entertaining kids.  Don't even get me started on tweens.  I remember saying to my mom, somewhere in my third trimester "What am I going to do with a baby?!"  And then I had one.  This perfect, tiny human..... and I am responsible for him.  It's like a switch flips and EVERYTHING changes.  Everything I "knew" I was... I became much more than that. And everything I thought or assumed about myself went out the window.  The most amazing thing I'll ever send in to the world is here and I'll never be just me again.  There's some saying about how having a child is like deciding to wear your heart on the outside of your body.... I totally get that now.  Although, that saying means something TOTALLY different to me these days.  But we'll get to the heart part of the story in my next post.

"Every night when I watch you sleep
I want to watch over you forever
Keep you safe with me
And I wish I could promise you a beautiful world
That would never break your heart
Maybe thats what we are here for
We try and fix what comes apart
Love takes the best of you"     - Catie Curtis